Privacy policy
Last updated: 4 November 2026
TerraHiker is made by Dotstar Inc., a company in Canada. This policy says what the app collects, why, and what you can do about it. It is the same for every hiker, wherever you live. In short: we don’t sell your data, and there are no ads.
Who is responsible for your data: Dotstar Inc., 302-722 Valley Rd, Kelowna, British Columbia V1V 0E2, Canada. Write to privacy@terrahiker.com.
What we collect
| What | Why | Where it lives |
|---|---|---|
| Your email address | To send your sign-in code. Nothing else. | Our server |
| Your sign-in sessions (when you signed in and last used the app; no device id) | To keep you signed in | Our server |
| Your handle (the public name you choose) | Shown next to the reports, comments and town updates you send | Our server; other hikers see it |
| Reports, comments and town updates you send: a hazard on the trail (what you saw, where on the trail by distance, when, and any note or photo you add), a hitch spot (placed where you stand, so it carries your GPS position), a comment on a place, or an update on a town. A hazard report never carries your GPS position. | So other hikers know what’s ahead | Our server; other hikers see it and its place, with your handle |
| Sharing counts: how many times you previewed, saved and shared a card, how many share suggestions you saw and tapped, and how many medals you earned. Never who you shared with. | To learn whether sharing is useful | Our server |
| Your hikes: which trail, how far along it you were and when, your GPS track while the app was open, the medals you earned, and your pace setting. Only you can see them, never other hikers. A hike you delete is removed from our server 30 days later. | So a new phone gets your hikes back | Our server |
| Your subscription status | To know whether you have Pro | Apple and RevenueCat (our subscription service); we never see your card |
We don’t log IP addresses, and the app has no analytics or crash-reporting tools.
Why we’re allowed to use it. Each row above rests on one of three reasons:
- To give you the app you asked for: your email and sign-in sessions, your handle, your hikes and their GPS tracks, your pace setting and your subscription status. Without them there is no account, no saved hikes and no Pro.
- Because you chose to: the position of a hitch spot you add (it is placed where you stand), and location itself, which you allow in iOS and can turn off there at any time.
- Because it helps us run the trails safely and well, without identifying you: the sharing counts, and the totals we may one day give land managers.
How long we keep it
While your account exists. A hike you delete leaves our server within 30 days, and its track goes with it. When you delete your account, everything in the table goes, except reports, which stay without your name because other hikers’ safety relies on that history. Our backups are deleted 60 days after they are made.
Your location
Location is used only while the app is open, to show you on the map and count your distance. We never track you in the background. If you add a hitch spot, your phone sends where you stand, so the spot is placed there. While the app is open on a hike, your position is kept with that hike on your account, so your hikes come back on a new phone. Nothing is recorded in the background, so the track has gaps whenever your phone is locked or the app is closed. Your track is never shared with anyone and never shown to other hikers. When you start a hike from where you are, your phone sends your position once so we can find you on the trail. That position becomes the first point of your hike’s track. To have no track, delete the hike, and its track goes with it (from our server within 30 days). Deleting your account removes all of them.
Land managers
We may share totals with parks and land-management agencies, such as how many hikers used a stretch of trail on a given day, to help them look after the trails. These are counts across many hikers, never anything that identifies you, and never a count so small it could point to one person. If we ever want to share more than totals, we’ll ask you first.
What we don’t do
No ads. No selling or renting your data. No tracking across other apps or websites. Other hikers never see your email. No automated decisions about you. Your medals and progress are counts of what you hiked.
Who helps us run it
- Amazon Web Services hosts our server, your photos and our backups, in the US West (Oregon) region. Maps come from our own server.
- Resend sends the sign-in code email.
- Apple and RevenueCat handle subscriptions. RevenueCat gets a random account id (never your email), your purchase details from Apple, your device model, iOS and app version, and your IP address.
They only get what they need to do that job.
Your data leaves Canada. Our server, your photos and our backups are in the United States, and so are Resend and RevenueCat. Canada’s privacy law covers Dotstar, and we use each of these companies under a data processing agreement that includes the standard contractual clauses the EU requires.
Your rights
Wherever you live, you can:
- See what we hold about you and get a copy: email privacy@terrahiker.com from the address you sign in with.
- Correct it: change your handle in the app. To change your email, write to privacy@terrahiker.com.
- Delete everything: in the app, Account → Delete account. We remove your email, sign-in sessions, saved hikes and their tracks, photos and sharing counts, and your handle becomes anonymous. Reports you sent stay without your name, because other hikers’ safety relies on that history. Your hikes are cleared from your phone.
- Stop a use you agreed to: turn off location for TerraHiker in iOS Settings.
- Ask us to pause or stop a use you think is wrong: privacy@terrahiker.com.
- Complain: to us at privacy@terrahiker.com, or to your data protection authority. In the EU that is your national authority, in the UK the Information Commissioner’s Office, and in Canada the Office of the Privacy Commissioner.
We answer every privacy request within 30 days.
Children
TerraHiker is not meant for children under 13, or under the age your country sets for agreeing to an app like this (up to 16 in parts of the EU). We don’t knowingly collect their data.
Changes
If this policy changes in a way that matters, we’ll say so in the app before it takes effect.